


no matter what

by jjokkiri



Series: monsta x bingo (winter 2017) [13]
Category: Monsta X (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Superheroes/Superpowers, Fluff, Hospitals, M/M, Mentions of Blood, Monsta X Bingo, Pre-Relationship, Roommates, slight angst
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-03-11
Updated: 2017-03-11
Packaged: 2018-10-02 21:58:10
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,540
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10228376
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jjokkiri/pseuds/jjokkiri
Summary: Kihyun can’t hate Hoseok, for some godforsaken reason.





	

**Author's Note:**

> Written for the _Superheros/Superpowers_ square of [Monsta X Bingo](http://archiveofourown.org/collections/MXbingo).

 

Sometimes, superpowers aren’t all they’re made out to be. They could be the coolest things in the world, but it also made you feel inclined to do things for the greater good with your special powers. Kihyun liked to think that his powers were a gift; he healed almost anything he touched, so becoming a doctor was one of the best things he could have done for the world. That had been decided since the first moment he placed his small hands, as a child, onto a bird which had crashed into a window, and then watched it happily flutter away when his touch healed a broken wing.

The moment he’d discovered his powers, it had been a thrill to his parents. Seeing their bright-eyed child realize that the one thing he wanted most was to help other people. So, they held his hand across the entire fiasco of learning how to use his powers, controlling it and finding someone to teach him how to use his powers to its maximum potential. Find someone to teach him to limit how much it would exhaust him to use his powers, because it was severely draining to a child who attempted to use his energy to heal something greater.

His mother was telepathic, and her powers granted her absolute domination in her career as lawyer. She’d been ecstatic about the fact that he could apply his abilities to a career and love it.

It was the best thing he could do for the sake of society, for certain. But, at the exact same time, it was the worst thing he could ever do on a smaller scale, because it meant he wasn’t always at home to look after the five year old he cared a little too much for.

And by five year old, he means his high-maintenance roommate, Hoseok. Who isn’t actually five years old (in fact, he happened to be older than Kihyun himself, if only by a couple months), but Kihyun liked to insist that he most definitely was, based on the way he could hardly handle his own powers.

Not every child was blessed with superpowers. Sometimes it was because neither parents carried the genes for granting such blessings; sometimes, it was because the child wasn’t fit for their potential abilities, even if both parents had genetically inheritable abilities. It was a rare phenomenon that no one quite understood, and science could hardly prove anything about the source of the superpowers. What mattered though, was that the two of them possessed superpowers and they needed to stick together, because society looked at them differently for their abilities.

Kihyun’s powers were a direct subcategory of the abilities his mother possessed; they belonged to the same classification of previously researched superpowers. He had done studies on his powers in university as a side project, but he refused to deduce the existence of superpowers to magic. He wanted reason.

Unfortunately, unlike Kihyun, some people didn’t research their own powers and some parents didn’t let their children hone their abilities and push them to maximum potential. Hoseok seemed to be one of the unlucky children who was blessed with powers, but his parents either wanted to suppress it, or they never bothered to let him learn more about his gift. Which was probably why Kihyun had to play as the older man’s babysitter half the time he was awake.

Hoseok, different from Kihyun, had the ability to play with gravity——whether it be levitating himself or other things; it was an extremely rare power which fell under some category of telekinesis if Kihyun recalled his research from when he first met Hoseok, correctly. Kihyun could understand the difficulty in controlling gravitational powers, but it almost seemed as if Hoseok got himself into trouble on purpose.

And every time Hoseok was in danger, alarms went off in Kihyun’s head, no matter how far apart they were. It was absolutely ridiculous.

Most times, he had to excuse himself from his duty at work to rush to Hoseok. His boss was luckily extremely understanding about his situation; Kihyun was grateful for Minhyuk, because he couldn’t risk letting his roommate die, when he could help it.

Especially because it seemed that Hoseok never actually learned about the limitations of his powers, and how to control when it set off.

The older man was like a hyperactive bunny, and when he got excited, Kihyun had to pray that his precious china dishes wouldn’t start floating across the room and smashing themselves against walls, courtesy of Hoseok’s thrill.

It was one of the scariest things to head home to their apartment, because he needed to make sure he stayed neutral if the apartment was up in flames. It was supposed to be normal, because it was Hoseok.

Except, Kihyun never actually could stay calm, no matter how much he tried. But it was just that. He couldn’t ever find it in himself to stay angry at Shin Hoseok. Or hate him, no matter how much he wanted to.

 

 

 

He’d been asked a thousand times over how he could ever be friends with someone who had powers which contrasted so significantly from the traits of his powers. He supposed that they were referring to the fact that Hoseok’s powers centered around something so seemingly destructive, while his were everything restorative.

Kihyun never quite saw the correlation, but Hoseok always looked so sad when anyone mentioned it. And usually, when they finally got back to their apartment, Kihyun would gently pat his back and promise him that he didn’t hate him; that they were friends for a good reason. It would make Hoseok smile a little bit, and Kihyun’s heart would flutter a little bit.

He’d blame that on the fact that Hoseok’s happiness was contagious.

There was a sudden crash from in the living room and Kihyun peeked his head out of the kitchen, eyebrow arched.

“Are you alright?” Kihyun exhaled. It was rhetorical, because he could see Hoseok sprawled on the floor with half of their bookshelf on top of him.

Hoseok’s response came in the form of a wheeze and Kihyun turned the stove off, rounding his way out of the kitchen and walking to where his roommate was on the floor. He bent down, making no effort to take any of the books off of Hoseok’s body. The blond peered at him from under the mess and Kihyun’s lips tugged into an amused smile.

In a second, there was a glow around each of the books on Hoseok’s body and they began to float off of his body. Kihyun watched as the blue light surrounded everything. He reached a hand out to grab one of the floating books, stacking them off to the side in a neat pile, so it would be easier for him to put them back on the shelf later.

Hoseok rolled out from under the mess and the books immediately smashed back onto the ground with a loud _thud!_

Kihyun winced, “You really need to work on putting things down gently.”

“Kihyun, I’m _hurt_ ,” Hoseok whined. Appeasing to Hoseok’s complaint, the young doctor feigned a pitying expression at him and tilted his head, as if he were speaking to a child and not a twenty-five year old man. It lasted a split second before he straightened up and exhaled, in exasperation.

And when he reached forward to place his hands on the other man’s injuries, tugging the back of Hoseok’s shirt up to expose the forming bruise (permission forgone, because they’d both done this way too many times for the older man to ever complain——not that he ever would), Hoseok grinned. Kihyun paused.

“Why are you smiling?”

“I’m happy,” Hoseok replied.

“You’re _hurt_.”

“But, does that mean I can’t be happy?”

“I am seriously starting to think that you’re using this all as an excuse to watch me glow, because you laughed the first eight-hundred times I did it.” he commented, pressing his fingers into Hoseok’s back and watching as a pink light radiated from his fingertips.

“No,” Hoseok replied, defensively but his tone remained entirely too calm (Kihyun narrowed his eyes), “Just because you glow pink and I think it’s cute doesn’t mean I purposefully hurt myself to watch you turn pink.”

As the bruise faded out of sight, Kihyun purposefully pushed his fingers deeper into the older man’s skin and watched as Hoseok winced, taking his revenge against the remark.

“What would you do without me?”

“Probably die,” he answered. Hoseok’s lips tugged into a cheeky smile, and in the most smothering tone he could manage, he grinned, “Thanks, _Kihyunnie_. I love you.”

Kihyun threw one of the books at him, and didn’t bother to heal him from that.

 

 

 

The next time that Kihyun was scheduled for a full shift at the hospital, Minhyuk had asked him to keep an eye on the few patients that were strapped up to several machines. It was an easy task in itself, but it required a careful eye. Sometimes, Kihyun felt like the hospital gave him tasks which were a little too simple and he didn’t deserve the salary he was blessed with——felt like he didn’t do enough for what he earned.

Kihyun was a treasure to the hospital and everyone knew of the facts——losing him would be losing an important asset to the establishment, especially because he was the only person his age with the powers to fix almost anything. But, that didn’t mean that he was willing to reap rewards that he didn’t work for.

Though, he couldn’t be anymore grateful of the tasks he was assigned, when his internal senses lit themselves in flames and warned him that a certain Shin Hoseok was getting into trouble. It’s generally an instinctive spark of something impending of horror that told him he needed to be with Hoseok, immediately.

Perhaps, that was why Minhyuk always gave him easy tasks——because he knew that Kihyun might have to run off duty at any given moment for the sake of keeping his roommate alive. Minhyuk had listened to him complain about Hoseok hundreds of times over, but he only ever graced him with an amused smile and eyes sparkling with curiosity and unvoiced questions.

Minhyuk always looked like he knew more than he ever told anyone. There was something about the doctor that was mysterious, and Kihyun was inclined to think that he possessed powers of his own that were never mentioned to anyone else. Sometimes, Kihyun spent his breaks thinking about what Minhyuk’s powers could be if he possessed them, and his boss would just give him a knowing smile, before ushering him back to work with an amused chuckle falling from his lips.

Right now, Kihyun’s nerves were skyrocketing, because he could sense that something was happening wherever Hoseok was, and he could only pray that he was at home. He was alone in the hospital hallway and there wasn’t a chance that he could leave the patients unattended, but his focus on them was straying with the nerves pricking at his mind.

He never understood why he could detect when something was happening to Hoseok——he’d always thought of it as because they were friends and he cared, but he couldn’t tell when others were in danger. It was just Hoseok.

Kihyun couldn’t ask for someone to take over his job, because he was alone in the hospital, lest he managed to head to the other wing of the hospital and ask Minhyuk to come back from where he was supposed to be checking up on a regular. If he could hold off for another few minutes, then _surely_ Minhyuk would come back.

There was the pattering of footsteps from behind Kihyun as he changed the IV needle pushed into the arm of one of the sleeping patients. He hadn’t even noticed it, until he was being spoken to, after he’d pulled the sleeve of the patient back down and rose to his standing position in the corner of the room, awkwardly trying to ignore his nerves.

“You look anxious,” came his boss’ familiar voice and Kihyun couldn’t help the exhale of relief as he turned to face Minhyuk. “Do you need to go somewhere? You can go, I’ll watch over the patients.”

He never had to tell Minhyuk anything, because the other doctor always seemed to know everything. Minhyuk always knew exactly what to say, and perhaps, that was why he was so good with the children who came to the hospital. Their fear was eased when they spoke to him, because he knew what they wanted to hear. It was something Kihyun, and the remainder of their entire faculty, admired.

“I have a full shift today,” Kihyun replied, eyes shaking.

Minhyuk placed a hand on his shoulder and smiled, “But, you have somewhere to be, don’t you? I’m here, don’t worry.”

And the guilt that flooded him when he ran out of the hospital, without even taking off the white coat on his shoulders and the stethoscope hanging around his neck, wouldn’t forgive him for the rest of his life if anything happened to the patients he’d done anything to, when he was shaking with anxiety.

But, they had Minhyuk now.

And Hoseok had no one.

 

 

 

Luckily, it wasn’t too late when he’d finally gotten back to their apartment building and found paramedics surrounding his roommate, who was sprawled on the floor of the foyer of the building. Just a couple meters away from where they were crouched, there was a smashed unrecognizable item on the ground and the lights in the dim space flickered. From where he was standing, he could see the faint glow from Hoseok’s body.

Immediately, he rushed to where they were crouched around him, pushing past the paramedics.

Someone grabbed his wrist, “Sir, you can’t go there!”

“I’m a doctor! You’re going to take him to a hospital anyway, let me be!”

Kihyun threw off their touch, flashing his hospital badge at them and glaring at them. His heart pounded in his chest as he crouched down beside Hoseok and everyone backed off, several steps. The blond’s eyes fluttered and he looked up at Kihyun, the blue light around him faltering for a brief moment.

“Kihyun,” Hoseok breathed.

“What the hell are you doing, trying to use your powers right now? Stop wasting your energy,” Kihyun scolded, the fear in his tone so clearly evident. “You’re going to kill yourself, you idiot!”

Slowly, the blue light around Hoseok’s body faded. The paramedics standing behind them awkwardly looked to one another, unsure of what to do, now that there was a certified doctor in front of them and not an immediate need to head back to the hospital. He gently moved Hoseok into his lap, fingers carding through the bloodstained blond locks.

“Tell me what happened,” Kihyun whispered, hands immediately moving to the back of Hoseok’s head, where there was an open cut and his hands glowed pink as he pressed it to the wound. Hoseok winced and Kihyun’s heart ached.

He was exhausted and healing Hoseok completely would drain too much of his energy, but he’d close up any of the open wounds he was able to. Scanning the scene, it seemed almost as if Hoseok had caused the shattering of the chandelier in the foyer, but the wounds on the older man’s body proved for it to have definitely been something else.

“I got into a fight,” Hoseok mumbled. Kihyun stared at him in disbelief, the pink light surround his hand flashing brightly for a split second and Hoseok jerked at the sudden increase of heat to his injury.

“In the middle of a foyer?” Kihyun asked, “And this badly?”

His roommate only managed to give him an awkward smile. And that was the moment Kihyun realized that there wasn’t very much that Kihyun knew of Hoseok’s personal life

“It’s okay,” Hoseok told him, weakly as Kihyun’s fingers forced the wound to regenerate and heal itself. His tone sounded terribly dejected, and immediately Kihyun’s mind flashed with a million different thoughts.

_Why is it okay? Why is this acceptable to you? Who hurt you? Who dared to hurt you?_

“It was bound to happen. I’m not normal, Kihyun.”

And terror flooded into his bloodstream when he finally realized: Hoseok never had the chance to learn how to use his powers, because his family was the type of people who hunted for the powered and suppressed them, because they weren’t _normal_. That’s why he’d moved out at such a young age.

Because they’re the exact same, despite the implications of their powers. They were identical, but to society, Kihyun’s restorative powers were a gift, and no matter how hard Hoseok tried to tame his own powers to something _helpful_ , he’d always be viewed as dangerous. The nature of his ability was destructive, and the powerless society couldn’t look past that.

It was why Hoseok looked so sad, every time someone dared to ask Kihyun why he was friends with _someone like that_.

Kihyun’s heart sank.

 

 

 

He’d always known that Hoseok was someone who needed someone else to help protect him, for whatever reason. From the moment they met, there had always been a protective instinct cast over his mind whenever he looked at Hoseok.

Minhyuk had granted him an entire week off, post calling in and telling him about how Hoseok was hurt and could potentially be in danger. And he’d never been so grateful to have someone so considerate in his life. Minhyuk was able to care for the patients before he was hired, and Minhyuk insisted he could still hold up with it——Kihyun wished he could do more, but his heart would always put those alike to him above anyone else; they were a kind who needed to be protected.

And Hoseok was fragile.

He still wouldn’t know why he had such a soft spot for Hoseok, despite the fact that just being around the older man stressed him out, because he was like a child who had yet to learn to walk straight. But, he’d always be happy to spend time with Hoseok, whether it meant that he needed to clean up the other’s silly messes, or if they were just sitting around doing nothing at all.

Maybe, it was because they were the same——different from most of the world, but blessed with powers that they could use for the better of the world. Maybe it was because he knew that Hoseok needed someone to help protect him, because so many people hunted those with destructive superpowers, even if those powers could be used for the better.

Maybe, that’s why he had such a soft spot for his roommate.

(Or maybe he’s just in love.)

He thought about it as he sat by Hoseok’s bedside, as the older man slept, and he played with the bandages, which he’d wrapped around his own fingers. There was a small bruise on the older man’s forehead, and Kihyun wondered if it was from when he’d thrown the book at him, a week ago, or if it was from something else. Hoseok was always someone who healed slowly, because he insisted on using his powers whenever he could, and his body never caught up with trying to regenerate its energy.

Reckless and over-ambitious; it was both annoying and admirable.

But, regardless of why he couldn’t find it in himself to hate the gorgeous blond, Kihyun sighed and pressed a soft kiss to Hoseok’s forehead, letting the bruise heal with the lingering of his lips on the spot.

Hoseok’s eyes suddenly fluttered open, “Did you just kiss me?”

His voice was quiet but the embarrassment screamed at Kihyun. There’s a wicked smirk on his lips and Kihyun immediately pulled away, cheeks flushed red.

“What?” he squawked, “No! What the hell?”

“What was that? It sure felt like a kiss,” Hoseok teased.

“You’re mistaken,” he replied, fumbling with the bandages in his hands. “And you’re also supposed to be asleep! Resting! Because you’re still healing from two days ago!”

Hoseok leaned back in his pillows, grinning to himself.

“So, you don’t have to touch things to heal them?” Hoseok questioned, raising an eyebrow.

“No,” Kihyun answered, biting down on his lower lip after a moment of silence. “I just have to come into some sort of physical contact with the wounds...”

There was another silence, and then Hoseok’s eyes flickered to him.

“Kihyun,” he started, smirking. The healer looked at him. “My lips hurt.”

The implication was processed immediately and Kihyun’s eyes widened, his cheeks immediately flushing a bright red and he threw one of the scattered plush toys at the older man, scrambling out of his seat and rushing to stand up and leave.

At his reaction, Hoseok laughed, but the impact of the pillow left him stunned for a second, before he registered what was happening.

“Wait, no! I’m hurt, Kihyun!”

“Stay hurt!”

Groaning, the younger man stormed out of the room, slamming the door shut and Hoseok could be heard laughing from inside the room. He’d return later——maybe when he was much less flustered.

(Maybe, he’d kiss him later.)


End file.
